Attack on Iraq will dismantle Arab world - 12 September, 2002

Mahfouz Azzam, Vice President of the Egyptian Labour Party, has declared that the way in which the USA is handling the war on terrorism will unleash Islamic powers hitherto friendly to the west against the interests of the USA.

In a symposium attended by politicians and clerics in Cairo on Monday, Mahfouz Azzam declared that “The 11th September was a key moment in the world history. It showed the real battle that opposes the western civilization to Islam and this was admitted by George Bush himself.”

He added that the question was no longer centred around Osama Bin Laden but that “the campaign against Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine, Kashmir and the Sudan will certainly awaken the sleeping giant, these being the Islamic forces which believed in a peaceful coexistence”.

Montasser Al-Zayat, the director of Future, the research centre which sponsored the symposium, declared that the USA’s management of the war against terrorism “constitutes a danger for our culture, our beliefs and our national security”. He added that “The Americans should ask themselves upon what motives the attacks on them were based.”

Ayman Al-Zawahiri, Bin Laden’s number two, was invited to participate in this symposium but did not respond.

Timothy BANCROFT-HINCHEY
PRAVDA.Ru